Barflies behaving badly: Regular at South End bar sucked into couple's angry argument; man at East Boston bar chased around billiards table before falling down stairs

Update: Board decides neither incident was foreseeable so no violation for either bar.

The Boston Licensing Board decides Thursday what to do about incidents at bars in the South End and East Boston in which patrons apparently looking for trouble found it.

On Nov. 5 of last year, a 20-year regular at the Franklin Cafe, 278 Shawmut Ave. in the South End was at the bar, minding his own business with his husband when he noticed a couple getting into what seemed like a heated dispute at a nearby table, according to cafe owner Dave DuBois and a police report.

At one point, the boyfriend left the couple to get something at the bar, according to the bar's owner, when the girlfriend softly told the regular's husband she was afraid of her boyfriend. But then, boyfriend returned to the table, girlfriend said the regular at the bar had been talking about him, and that revved up the boyfriend, who got up, pulled the regular toward the table and growled "get the fuck out of here before I kill you!" according to the police report.

The regular managed to disengage and punched in 911 while bar staff told the man he was no longer welcome and had to leave immediately. DuBois said the man actually returned to the bar another time, but the bartender recognized him and told him to get out. He has not returned since.

"It seems like a very odd situation," DuBois said.

The board also heard of an odd situation on the night of March 8 at NFarra, 127 Maverick St. in East Boston's Maverick Square.

A man spotted his former boss up there on the second floor and couldn't resist bringing up all the alleged ways the boss had screwed him out of wages and even locked him in the workplace that one time, the man acknowledged. His ex-boss apparently didn't want his laundry being aired in public, so he smacked the man upside the head with a beer bottle and then began chasing him around a billiards table. As he was being chased, the man told the board, he fell down a flight of 20 stairs to the ground level.

Police say EMS was summoned but that the man declined transportation to a hospital.

The man told the board he did not blame NFarra at all for what happened. In fact, he doubled as a translator for the restaurant's owner during the hearing.

The board has to decide whether the bars could have prevented the incidents and, if so, whether any sanctions are warranted.